More infromation about Sacrament of Reconciliation

Read the Catechism in a Year

Catechism in a Year: Day 195

Part Two: How We Celebrate the Christian Mysteries
- Section Two: The Seven Sacraments of the Church
-- Chapter One: The Sacraments of Healing -- PENANCE and RECONCILIATION

Question 237: Are there sins that are so serious that not even the average priest can forgive them?  

There are sins in which a man turns completely away from God and at the same time, because of the seriousness of the deed, incurs excommunication. When a sin results in “excommunication”, absolution can be granted only by the bishop or a priest delegated by him, and, in a few cases, only by the Pope. In danger of death, any priest can absolve from every sin and excommunication.

A Catholic who, for example, cooperates in an abortion automatically excludes himself from sacramental communion; the Church simply acknowledges this fact. The purpose of “excommunication” is to correct the sinner and to lead him back to the right path.  

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Question 238: May a priest later repeat something he has learned in confession? 

No. Under no circumstances. The secrecy of the confessional is absolute. Any priest who would tell another person something he had learned in the confessional would be excommunicated. Even to the police, the priest cannot say or suggest anything.

There is hardly anything that priests take more seriously than the seal of the confessional. There are priests who have suffered torture for it and have gone to their deaths. Therefore, you can speak candidly and unreservedly to a priest and confide in him with great peace of mind, because his only job at that moment is to be entirely “the ear of God”. 

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Question 239: What are the positive effects of confession? 

Confession reconciles the sinner with God and the Church.

The second after absolution is like a shower after playing sports, like the fresh air after a summer storm, like waking up on a sunlit summer morning, like the weightlessness of a diver … . Everything is contained in the word “reconciliation” (from a Latin verb meaning “to bring back together, to restore”): we are at peace with God again. 

Dig Deeper: Corresponding CCC section (1467-1498) and other references here.

Recommended Reading: History of the Catholic Church by James Hitchcock